The A1C Test

Diabetes is a continual learning experience that sometimes translates to other areas of your life.  Take my first experience with the A1C test.  An A1C test is like the daily blood test except that the A1C test will show how well you are managing your blood sugar lever, usually over a three-month period.

My first one was suggested within a month of my having been diagnosed with this dread condition.  My doctor then said it might be helpful and I wanted to ask how, but I didn’t.  I also knew what the results would be, because I had been in denial for over four months about my diabetes. 

What I should have asked was “How much?”  But that would have shown foresight and I am legally blind in this area.  So the blood was drawn, sent to the lab, which then sent back the results and a bill for $371.00.  Well, I found out my heart was still good, otherwise that would have given me a heart attack.

I paid payments on that thing for three months, $50.00 at a time, and then I got curious, so I called those people at the lab and I asked them “Why did you all charge me so much?”  Their answer was that this was about my health, blah, blah, blah, and I interrupted and asked “How is this about my health?”  And they said you need to know how your blood sugar level was doing and I said “I know how my blood level was doing, it was high.”  And they said yes, but you need to know how high, and I said, “I know how high, it was danged high.  What I want to know is how much did it cost you to do the test?  Show me where you spent even close to $371.00 and I’ll finish paying you, otherwise, I’m cutting you off.”  They couldn’t, so I did,

I bring this up because in the article in last Wednesday’s Appalachian about the new town to be built on a mountaintop removal site, the sentence that nearly stopped me from reading it was this:  “…Rutherford…announcing the county has been approved to spend $300,000 in multi-county coal severance tax funds to study  the possibility of establishing the new community.” 

Study the possibility?

Now there are a lot of people in this county to whom $300,000 is a good deal of money, and I am one of those people.  So for those people, I would like to ask some questions similar to the ones I posed to that lab.  Oh, don’t fret if you are one of those who can answer them.  As my cousin Vinny said in the movie of the same name, “Just shout ‘em right out if you know the answers.’

First of all, who decided how much was needed to do this study?  Secondly, how is the study going to be conducted?  Thirdly, is it really going to cost that much?  Fourth, who is going to get the money for doing the study?  And finally, when the money has been spent and the study is in, can I see how the money was spent?

I ask because my uneducated opinion is the town won’t be built.  And it’s free.  I just want to know how the pros do it.